We think Gov. Hickenlooper should give this policy every consideration. It would certainly suck some of the sanctimonious air out of public hearings, and would have been a spectacularly productive tool during the oil and gas task force meetings.

Of course, with every good idea put to use by the states, someone from the federal government has to stomp their bureaucratic Birkenstocks and shout about the world coming to an end.

We expected that someone to be from the EPA, Energy Department or even Interior, but it turns out it’s Secretary of State John Kerry’s job to oversee scientific hubris.

“We literally do not have the time to debate whether we can say ‘climate change.’ We have to solve climate change,” Kerry said. “When science tells us that our climate is changing and human beings are largely causing that change, by what right do people just stand up and say, ‘I dispute that,’ or ‘I deny this elementary truth’?”

By what right? We’re fairly sure it’s the same one you tried to defend. Look beside Amendment Number One, it’s pretty clear.

It’s one thing to agree that the climate is warming, but it’s a whole other argument as to whether it’s caused by jet-setting millionaire yachters who also happen to be Secretary of State.